


Odysseus and Athena

by tinta_roja



Category: Bandom
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-03-25
Updated: 2009-03-25
Packaged: 2017-12-23 01:17:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/920278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tinta_roja/pseuds/tinta_roja
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ryan looks up at the brokenly contiguous pieces of the night sky through the glass and tries to contemplate life and his purpose on the planet, but ends up just contemplating Amanda.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Odysseus and Athena

They lie on their backs beneath the geodesic dome. Ryan looks up at the brokenly contiguous pieces of the night sky through the glass and tries to contemplate life and his purpose on the planet, but ends up just contemplating Amanda. She’s lying on her back next to him, eyes closed, face turned toward the sky, eyebrows drawn like constellations across her unwrinkled brow. She’s serene as a goddess, arms flung above her head, long piano playing fingers pointing toward the tail of the big dipper, where Polaris faintly glows.  
  
Her skin is like marble, and she’s so still that Ryan could have mistaken her for a statue if it weren’t for her breathing. A statue of a goddess. Amanda is more or less a goddess as far as he’s concerned; she’s been touring for five years, has two records out, plays the piano like there’s no tomorrow and does absolutely whatever she pleases. He’ll be the first to deny it, but he has learned from her. He stops, the words “Bostonian Athena” springing to his mind, his lips. He sees her, red hair whipped around her face by a salty wind blowing up from Cape Cod, at the prow of a ship painted black and white like piano keys, leading the charge to bring artists—painters, musicians, photographers, stilt-walkers, anyone—out into the world, bringing art directly to the people. She is wise, and seeks truth in words and music, but her eyes are not grey like in the Greek myths, they are blue and electric and fiery. Ryan wonders if he is anything like Odysseus, counting on a goddess to shield him from the treacherous waters of fans and tour buses and his own inner emptiness.  
  
“Ryan Ross,” Amanda’s gentle voice startles him, and he stares back down into her blue eyes, “You’re thinking in metaphors again. Stop. Be here. This is real.” She takes his hand, warm and gentle, and he feels her pulse thrumming in her wrist.  
  
His heart thumps. He can hear conversations drifting upward, people speaking softly about creative drives and Zen Buddhism. He is here, landing with a thump back inside himself.  
  
Amanda squeezes his hand. “You’d be better off, Ryan Ross, if you took yourself a little less seriously.” Truer words have never been spoken, and this time Ryan will try to heed them. After all, life isn’t about metaphors. Life is about the touch of hands and breathing in deep to smell tea brewing downstairs and looking up at the stars for one long moment before heading back out on the road, to find yourself by bringing art back to the forefront, the battlefield. People will fight for the things they care about. Ryan doesn’t want to fight right now, he just wants to walk down the street, guitar strapped to his back, and find the truth, with a blue-eyed goddess to guide his steps.


End file.
